Welcome, this site is to help you find your Sanilac County genealogy and local history. I have looked for and linked to many sites that may help you with your Sanilac County research. I will also do free lookups of births, deaths, and marriage records. I will also take pictures of tombstones in local cemeteries, when weather permits. So take a look around the site and I hope you enjoy it as much as I have enjoyed putting it together for you. Come back often and please report any errors.

12/29/2011

I will still be able to do Look Ups from what I have in my own collection this coming year. Now I may be traveling this winter so I would like to start maybe in April to go and do look ups again at the Courthouse in Sanilac County.

Now I have everyone requests for Courthouse look ups and will be going through them during the winter months while I am gone. When I get back I will contact you and see if you still need a look up at the Courthouse.

Now if you are new and would like me to do a look up I still can do that with what I have here at home and when while I am gone, then I can add you to my list of Courthouse look ups if you need me too do that for you. Now my list is big already but if you are not in a big hurry I would be glad to add you to my Courthouse list to do in April.

3 comments:

Monette L. Cortez
said...

Hi There, I would like to find a death date for Jeremiah Thomas who lived in Sanilac, Sanilac, MI. It was after 1880 and his wife was Susan V. Jeremiah was born in Oh or NY.Thanks so much. Monette L. Cortez monettec2015@yahoo.com

Hi Kathy, I am looking for any information I can find about Nelson and Elizabeth Barwick. They are shown living there in the 1860 and 70 census. I am primarily interested in their son Thomas who was with them in 1860 but relocated to Wayne Co. by 1870 where I have never found any further information. Very interested if there was any obituary for Nelson (died 1879) or Elizabeth (dies 1902) or any kind of will/land records that might give me a clue about Thomas at the time of his parents deaths.

While renovating my Marlette home I found a book in the wall. The name Dorothy Petersen was written on the cover. The copyright on the book was 1910. The only thing I have been able to find is a deed showing Henry W. Petersen purchased the property on March 13, 1911. I would like to find out who Dorothy was and if the Petersen's built the home. I would appreciate any help you could provide me with solving the mystery.

Welcome to "The Sanilac County Genealogy and Local History Blog"

Obituaries for Sanilac County

The Sandusky District Library site now has some new databases to do obit look ups, cemetery lookups, and many more. What a great opportunity for all of us to find an obituary or many other great information to find our Ancestors.

How To Use This Site

To Reply to a Comment that someone else Posted:

Just click on the words "Comment" or "Post a Comment" next to or below that Post. It will take you to a page and on that page there will be a box to leave your comment. So once you leave your comment look below and if you already have a Google or Blogger account you can use it to sign in.

Now if you do not want to go through getting an account at this time you can type in your comment then you can choose "Anonymous" or "Name/URL". Now you only have to type in your Name, the URL is optional. I will see how this goes and as long as no one abuses this option I will keep it this way.

History of Sanilac County, Michigan

The area that would become known as Sanilac County, was originally made part of St. Clair County. for judicial purposes. The area extended to Saginaw Bay and west to Tuscola County in 1848, the Legislature authorized the separate organization of the county and Lexington was the county seat until 1879 when it was moved to Sandusky.

In the Census of 1850, Sanilac Co. had three townships: Worth Lexington and Sanilac. Worth and Lexington Townships were close to the present size; Sanilac Twp. included the rest of the territory in Sanilac and Huron Counties.

The county was covered with forests and travel was difficult. A pioneer account from the HISTORY OF SANILAC COUNTY 1834-1984 p. 225 states Upon their arrival at the Fort (Ft. Gratiot) their packs were remade and only the absolute necessitates could be taken as the balance of the trip, a distance of about 24 miles, had to be made on foot. The balance of the belongings were left at the Fort to be picked up at a later date. There were no roads, only a trail made by the Indians through the woods. This story took place about 1842.

The names of this pioneer and his wife were David & Susanna Taylor McClure. The first settler was Joel Carrington who came into the area that is now know as Worth Twp. in 1834. Reuben Dimmon was 2nd settler and taught the first school just south of the Village of Lexington. Early pioneers as stated in the Portrait and Biographical Album-1884 included Dr. Woodard, John Smith, Uri Raymond, John Ryan, William Leonard, George Smith; William Austin, and the list goes on. See our complete list elsewhere.

Political unrest in Ontario and the promise of jobs in the lumber mills brought many to Sanilac Co. These settlers were of Scotch, Irish and English nationality. By 1860, the townships of Fremont, Speaker, Maple Valley, Buel, Elk, Washington, Marlette, Bridgehampton, Forester, and Austin had been organized and the southern part of the county was being cleared for farming. The first newspaper was The Sanilac Jeffersonian established at Lexington in 1858 and still in operation, is now located in Croswell.

In an article on the front page of The Jeff April 27, 1861 we read an account of a war rally to recruit soldiers to fight for the Union cause in the Civil War. The Sanilac Pioneers, better known as Co. D, 10th Michigan Infantry with Capt. Israel Huckins was made up of many men from Sanilac Co. By 1870 all but two townships were organized. Evergreen, 1873, Custer in 1877 and Wheatland in 1881 completed Sanilac Co. as we know it today.

Sanilac Co. is an agricultural county with sugar beets, corn, wheat, oats, soy beans, and hay as its major crops. Some of Sanilac Counties tourist attractions are the Sanilac Co. Historical Museum in Port Sanilac; the historic Sanilac Petroglyphs in Greenleaf Twp.; the picturesque village of Lexington; Croswell's Swinging Bridge; and many other interesting sites.

Check out all the information, search engines and web links.

Just scroll down this page and you will find great links for Sanilac County Genealogy and Historical. To look at the pictures from the Historical Picture collection, just "Click" on the picture and it will take you to a site to see more pictures.

I also have some very interesting Search Engines for some very interesting web sites for general genealogy that may be of some help to you as they have helped me very much.

If you find anything that may be incorrect on this site please email or post your comment to me.

Have fun and I hope you find just what you are looking for, if you do not I will try and find just the right person, group or site that might be able to help you.

Sanilac County Genealogical Society

Genealogy and Local History Videos

Offering to do obituary lookups in Marlette Leader Newspaper dating from 1880 to present. I am currently working on the Marlette Leader Newspaper Obituary Index. Not all years are mircofilmed, currently I do know that 1912, 1913, 1920 and 1948 are missing. Being that Marlette Township was on the border of both Lapeer and Tuscola Counties, there are obits from those surrounding areas. Feel free to email Amy at angel_ofa_face@yahoo.com

Bureau of Land Management Patent Search

This Search Engine has to be one of my greatest finds. You may know about it but it was new to me.

The Making of America is a web site where they scanned in books on primarily sources related to development of the U.S. infrastructure. You may say why would this interested me but it has a wealth of information (and I only search a few words, Sanilac County and of few of my surnames I am working on with great luck). So give it a try. Here is a little bit about this wonderful site.The initial phase of the project, begun in the fall of 1995, focused on developing a collaborative effort between the University of Michigan and Cornell University. At the University of Michigan, approximately 1,600 books and ten journals with imprints primarily between 1850 - 1877 were selected, scanned, and made available through the present system. Librarians, researchers, and instructors continue to work together to determine the content of this digital library and to evaluate the impact of this resource on research and teaching at both institutions.

So give this search engine a try and the best of luck to all that do try.

Making of America Book Search

Interment.net Search - Search for Cemetery Records From All Over the World